So that's it – Wales Week London and Wales Week Worldwide are over for another year!
Together with our amazing partners, supporters and event hosts, we’ve now hosted a Wales Week for five successive years – each year, it is the single, largest programme of events promoting Wales, both in London and around the world.
For the two weeks surrounding St David’s Day this year, Wales Week London hosted some 70 different activities and events covering Welsh food and drink, sport, art exhibitions, concerts and musical performances, political and economic debate, comedy, design, quizzes, cookery and painting demonstrations, business promotions and professional advice, cinema, film, the media, fintech, cyber and more – once again it has been a wonderfully packed and varied programme.
This year’s programme has been delivered completely online of course – a remarkable testimony to the energy, imagination and commitment of the many people and organisations, who delivered each activity and who contributed to bringing Wales Week to life for the fifth successive year.
(And as a one-off this year, we have added one more event - a special Welsh sports event with our partner the Welsh Sports Association, taking place on 19th March to appeal to Welsh people around the world who would like an opportunity to lend their expertise to help Welsh sport - details here https://walesweek.london/whats... )
And around the world, despite the obvious challenges everyone has been faced with, Wales Week events were still able to be held in New England, Pittsburgh, New York and Kansas in the United states, and in Melbourne, Paris, Beijing, Berkshire, Osaka and Hungary – as well as a designated Wales Week Food Fortnight, which saw various food tastings and demonstrations by numerous Welsh food and drinks producers and chefs.
All in all, both the Wales Week London and Wales Week Worldwide programmes delivered some 130 different activities and events to digital audiences in Wales, across the UK and around the world during a single fortnight.
On its own, Wales Week London has now delivered a total of 449 events over the last five years – and already, for 2022, we have been approached by organisations for new events next spring, and by new sponsors – so the momentum continues to build, and work on the largest annual programme of events promoting Wales has already started for next year.
And we are looking forward to building the Wales Week Worldwide programme further by reactivating our partnerships in places like Tokyo, Dublin, New Mexico, Bangkok, Toronto, Ohio, British Columbia, Hong Kong, Dubai, Vancouver, Newcastle, and in new destinations such as Glasgow, Birmingham, Oslo, Patagonia, Ottawa, Switzerland and elsewhere.
Wales Week London and the Wales Week programmes held around the world are simply the result of the determination, goodwill and energy of so many brilliant people and organisations – we can’t thank you enough – and we look forward to next year, when Wales Week will return with face-to-face events once more, as well as capitalise on the new digital opportunities to bring a hybrid programme of activities and events celebrating our culture and heritage, commemorating our national day and promoting a modern Wales to the rest of the world.
Diolch yn fawr.
